Fusion Corporate Partners

Sugar Inc. has signed a definitive agreement to acquire FreshGuide Inc., which operates FreshGuide.com and BookFresh. FreshGuide.com is an online women-focused city guide that provides access to exclusive daily offers from a selection of local businesses in beauty, health and fitness, dining, travel getaways and other relevant categories. BookFresh provides an online booking service for local businesses, such as spas and salons.

Sugar Inc. is a diversified women’s media company that includes PopSugar Network and PopSugar TV, producing original content and social community for women, and ShopStyle, a social shopping service that brings together the most fashionable stores and the best brands. Sugar has had rapid organic audience growth since inception four years ago and today reaches over 16M monthly unique visitors globally. The company is privately held and backed by investor Sequoia Capital.

“We are constantly striving to add innovative offerings that entertain and delight our audience,” said Brian Sugar, founder and CEO of Sugar Inc. “We felt there were tremendous synergies between Sugar and FreshGuide that could be achieved by combining our large audience with their local service. We are very excited to be able to bring to our readers exclusive daily offers at the best places to eat, exercise, shop and relax in their local areas.”

FreshGuide was founded in 2008 by Ryan Donahue, a veteran of Pay Pal, and launched its first service, BookFresh, later that year. In January 2010, the company launched Freshguide.com to provide local offers by city. Currently, FreshGuide operates in four markets: San Francisco, Silicon Valley, Los Angeles and Seattle. FreshGuide will continue to operate under Sugar Inc. as a separate brand.

“FreshGuide is focused on providing exclusive, local offers for women. By integrating our service with the PopSugar Network’s addictive editorial content, we are creating a city-based editorial and offers of unmatched quality in the market,” said Donahue. “This acquisition will also allow us to dramatically expand our reach and accelerate our growth. We plan to launch FreshGuide in 30 additional cities over the next 18 months in the U.S. and internationally in the UK, France, Germany and Australia where Sugar Inc. has operations.”

Location: USA, San Francisco, CA

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BuzzMedia, the entertainment publisher, today announced the addition of six music sites. According to paidContent three are acquisitions – PureVolume, Concrete Loop and Gorilla vs. Bear. The other three are described as partnerships. They are PopMatters, , The Hype Machine, and RCRD LBL. Buzz Media say together they connect with over five million fans every month.

Location: USA, Hollywood, CA

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Lewis DVorkin, Founder & Chief Executive Officer, has announced that Forbes Media is acquiring True/Slant. Dvorkin describes True/Slant as an original content news network. He envisaged a new model that combined the values and editorial standards of traditional news with the immediacy and interactivity of the digital medium.

Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

The company’s original investors were Forbes and Fuse Capital.

Writing about the deal Dvorkin says, “The small True/Slant team, with more than 100 years of Web, publishing and TV experience, will now be working side-by-side with talented and dedicated journalists at Forbes Media. The goal: to work together to further develop a mindset around the  power of the Web and traditional news values. With hard work, we can implement new blogging platforms and more efficient digital, print and video content creation models; we can find better ways for audiences to engage with news and information; and we can pursue new integrative approaches for marketers and advertisers.”

He also writes, “The True/Slant team is quite proud that it helped lead the way in producing high quality content in an efficient manner. Now, we are incredibly excited about moving our ideas and passion on to the bigger stage of Forbes.com and all of Forbes Media’s other properties.”

Location: USA, New York, NY

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Beyond Commerce has signed a Letter of Intent to acquire WebYES!. The Board of Directors of both companies has approved the acquisition and the transaction is anticipated to close within the next 30 business days.

WebYES! owns and operates a network of high-traffic web properties focused on finance, insurance, automotive products and services. The web properties contain advice for consumers and offer a variety of specialized products and services to suit their needs. 

In 2009 WebYES! had $19.5 million in revenues and $3.5 million of EBITDA. Currently, WebYES! is exceeding last year’s revenues in a year-to-date comparison. In the first quarter of 2010, WebYES! had over 2,000,000 unique visitors to web sites such as   www.zipinsurancerates.com, www.fastcashmatch.net,  www.debtmatch.net, www.findyourcustomers.com, and www.aplusautoprotection.com , and has generated over 400,000 targeted customers. 

“We are very excited about becoming an integral part of Beyond Commerce,” states Brett Cravatt, CEO and Founder of WebYES!.  “In order to further improve our lead quality and results for our advertisers, we will leverage the proprietary customer acquisition platform that Beyond Commerce has acquired through its recent purchase of AdJuice.”

Location: USA, Henderson, NV

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